Tornadoes · United States · Missouri · 1996

F0 tornado, Dillard, Missouri, December 23, 1996

This F0 tornado ran 0.5 miles across Crawford County on December 23, 1996, touching down at 10:45 AM CST and reaching 50 yards wide. It killed nobody.

The rating scale

Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.

  1. F040 to 72 mphthis tornado

    Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

  2. F173 to 112 mph

    Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

  3. F2113 to 157 mph

    Considerable damage. Roofs torn off well-built houses, frame homes shifted on their foundations, mobile homes destroyed, large trees snapped or uprooted, cars lifted off the ground.

  4. F3158 to 206 mph

    Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.

  5. F4207 to 260 mph

    Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

  6. F5261 to 318 mph

    Incredible damage. Strong frame houses swept off their foundations, car-sized missiles thrown more than 100 meters, steel-reinforced concrete badly damaged, high-rise buildings deformed.

  7. Unrated

    The survey recorded a tornado but could not put a number on it, most often because it crossed open country and damaged nothing a rating can be read from.

The record

Rating
F0
Date
December 23, 1996
Touchdown
10:45 AM CST (16:45 UTC)
Path length
0.5 miles (0.8 km)
Path width
50 yards (46 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Crawford County
Touchdown point
37.730, -91.220
Lift-off point
37.730, -91.220
Record number
1043

What the Weather Service recorded

The highway patrol reported a small tornado touched down briefly near Dillare. Damage was limited to downed trees.

From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.

The warnings

18 minutes of warning. NWS LSX issued a tornado warning for this county at 16:27 UTC, 18 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 17:30 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
16:27 UTC17:30 UTCTornado WarningLSX

Every warning and watch covering the touchdown point that day, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service products. Lead time is measured from the issue of the warning in force to the touchdown time in the database, both of which were recorded to the minute by different people.

The forecast that day

The Storm Prediction Center had this point in a General Thunderstorms Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 05:52 UTC.

SPC's Day 1 convective outlook as it stood when the tornado began, read at the touchdown point. The same archive is on the radar archive.

The air that afternoon

The radiosonde launches on either side of the tornado, from the nearest station that was launching then, drawn and analyzed the way Storm Lab does: the same diagram, the same parcel and shear definitions SPC's mesoanalysis uses.

Springfield, MO (KSGF), 12:00Z

4.8 hours before the tornado, 246 km from the path. December 23, 1996.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Springfield, MO at 12:00Z on 1996-12-23Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 237 joules per kilogram, CIN -72, lifted condensation level 818 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°30°40°
Temperature in red, dew point in green, the mixed-layer parcel dashed. The warm shading is its CAPE, the cool shading the inhibition it has to break through.
HodographHodograph, Springfield, MO at 12:00Z on 1996-12-23The wind through the lowest 10 kilometers as a curve, rings every 10 meters per second labeled in knots. Zero to 1 km storm-relative helicity 414 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 68 knots.1939587897Sfc1 km3 km6 km9 kmRMLM
The wind turning with height, colored by layer: ground to 1 km, 1 to 3 km, 3 to 6 km, 6 to 10 km. RM and LM are the right and left moving storms Bunkers' method gives; the shaded area is the 0 to 1 km storm-relative helicity.
Mixed-layer CAPE
237 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-72 J/kg
Surface CAPE
118 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
818 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
68 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
41 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
414 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
442 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.4
Supercell composite
1.5
0-3 km lapse rate
6.3 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Springfield, MO (KSGF), 00:00Z

7.2 hours after it, 246 km from the path. December 24, 1996.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Springfield, MO at 00:00Z on 1996-12-24Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 2 joules per kilogram, CIN 0, lifted condensation level 502 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°30°40°
Temperature in red, dew point in green, the mixed-layer parcel dashed. The warm shading is its CAPE, the cool shading the inhibition it has to break through.
HodographHodograph, Springfield, MO at 00:00Z on 1996-12-24The wind through the lowest 10 kilometers as a curve, rings every 10 meters per second labeled in knots. Zero to 1 km storm-relative helicity -168 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 81 knots.1939587897117Sfc1 km3 km6 km9 kmRMLM
The wind turning with height, colored by layer: ground to 1 km, 1 to 3 km, 3 to 6 km, 6 to 10 km. RM and LM are the right and left moving storms Bunkers' method gives; the shaded area is the 0 to 1 km storm-relative helicity.
Mixed-layer CAPE
2 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
0 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
502 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
81 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
21 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-168 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
-149 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
1.0 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The St Louis radar (KLSX), 118 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 16:42 UTC.

Open the radar archive at this moment, over the track

Reflectivity and velocity, decoded from the Level II archive in the browser. Volumes take a few seconds to open the first time.

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1996 tornado in MissouriEvery tornado in Missouri since 1950Warnings in force in Missouri nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of December 23, 1996

4 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
December 2311:30 AM CSTF0Texas, MO1.050
December 2310:00 AM PSTF1Marin, CA6.020$200,000
December 2311:30 AM PSTF0Sonoma, CA0.3201$1,000
December 232:55 PM CSTF1Randolph, IL2.070

What this means

Ratings are the survey's, read off the damage rather than measured; the rating scale is above. Tornado counts rise through the record as reporting improved, so a year in the 1950s is not comparable with one today except for the strongest tornadoes, which were always noticed.

Sources

NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.